Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 41.djvu/191

 (Pipe Roll, 1 Ric. I. 69, 194), and sat as one of the king's justices at Westminster and in the country in 1202 and later. In 1205 King John granted Henry Fitzpeter de Northampton license to make a park at Little Lunford (probably Ludford in Lincolnshire) (Rotuli Chartarum, ed. Hardy, i. 151), and from that year to 1207 Henry was joint-sheriff of Northamptonshire (Close Rolls, i. 34, 77). It may be inferred that he joined the baronial party, of which until his death Geoffrey Fitzpeter had been leader, for in November 1215 his lands and houses in Northampton were given away by the king (ib. p. 238). He received letters of protection in the following March. He founded an hospital within the precincts of St. Paul's, London (Monasticon, vi. 767). Dugdale (Baronage, i. 705) reckons a Henry, dean of Wolverhampton, among the sons of Geoffrey Fitzpeter, earl of Essex, and it does not seem possible to distinguish clearly between him and this Henry de Northampton. 

NORTHAMPTON or COMBERTON, JOHN (d. 1397), lord mayor of London, was a draper of high repute in the company and was elected alderman of the city 20 Aug. 1375 (, Memorials of London, pp. 400, 404, 409); he was one of the sheriffs in 1377, was elected a member for the city in 1378 (Returns of Members, i. 200), and in 1380 was a commissioner for building a tower on the bank of the Thames for the protection of the shipping. He was elected to the mayoralty in 1381. He was one of the most prominent supporters of Wiclif in London, was no doubt connected with the interruption of Wiclif's trial at Lambeth in 1378, and with the interference of the citizens with the trial of John Aston in 1382 (, i. 356, ii. 65). The Londoners were at this time divided into two parties [see under ], and Northampton was the head of John of Gaunt's faction, while as regards municipal politics, which since 1376 had, owing to a change of procedure, run very high (Liber Albus, i. 41), he appears to have been leader of the party which sought to gain the favour of the populace and the members of the smaller companies, and to depress the great victualling companies. Relying on the support of his party, and specially of the Duke of Lancaster, he encouraged the citizens to set at nought the jurisdiction of their bishop by taking into their own hands the punishment of breaches of chastity. They imprisoned women guilty of these offences in the prison called the Tun on Cornhill, shaved their heads, and paraded them publicly with trumpets and pipes playing before them, and dealt in like fashion with their paramours, declaring that the prelates were negligent and venal, and that they would purify their city themselves. He was a bitter enemy of the London fishmongers, who were upheld by Sir Nicholas Brembre and Sir John Philipot [q. v.], both of the Grocers' Company, and Nicholas Exton of the Fishmongers' Company. He obtained from the king, Richard II, the extinction of their monopoly, prevented them from selling in the country, compelling them to sell in one market at a price fixed by the mayor, and with other citizens presented a petition to the king on which was founded an act of parliament that no fishmonger or other victualler should be eligible for the mayoralty or other judicial office (Statutes at Large, ii. 257). By these measures he brought the company so low that he is said to have forced the fishmongers to declare that they were unworthy to be ranked among the crafts or mysteries of the city. As his proceedings, while raising the price of fish in the country, lowered it in London, they were highly popular among the poorer class (, ii. 66). He is said to have attempted to depress others of the companies, but to have been checked. Nor did he accomplish so much without meeting with violent opposition. On one occasion he was insulted in his court, and on another a fishmonger was committed to prison for speaking against him (Memorials, pp. 462, 472). So long, however, as he was mayor, he made his position good, and forced Sir John Philipot to resign his aldermanry, because he was allied with his enemies. In 1383 he was succeeded in the mayoralty by Brembre, whose election was carried by the strong hand of certain crafts, and with the approval and perhaps help of the king. Northampton's work was at once undone, the fishmongers regained their privileges, and the greater companies triumphed.

He did not submit quietly to his defeat; the party that he led was numerous and excited, there was talk of making him mayor in spite of his enemies, and the supporters of Brembre believed that the new lord mayor's life was threatened. Northampton was joined by a large number of men when he walked